Archbishop Quigley Center

About Archbishop Quigley Center

Chandelier & Light Fixture Restoration

Archbishop Quigley Center is located in Chicago at 103 East Chestnut Street near Chicago’s famous water tower and adjacent to Loyola University. Prior to its close on June 22, 2007, Archbishop Quigley Preparatory Seminary was a Roman Catholic high school for young men contemplating the priesthood. In November of 2008, extensive renovation of all four levels of the historic building’s 86,700 square foot interior was completed and Quigley became home to the new archdiocesan Pastoral Center, containing the offices of the archbishop's curia and Archdiocese of Chicago. The renovation also included a new open stairway providing easier public access to St. James Chapel.

Quigley was added to the National Register of Historic Places on February 16, 1996. By this time, the main spire had already been torn down due to major storm damage and the Archdiocese opened the Seminary to the public for the first time in an attempt to recover from economic restraints that had been consistently plaguing the seminary causing the seminary to close. This was extremely influential because the Archdiocese of Chicago is the largest seminary system in the United States. Fortunately this decision was effective and by 1997, the seminary had enough money to begin major restoration.

Quigley's History

Quigley Center is named after The Most Rev. James Edward Quigley, who served as archbishop of Chicago from 1903 to 1915. He is credited with establishing the concept of the high school seminary with the founding of the Cathedral College of the Sacred Heart in October of 1905. Archbishop Quigley had shared his vision of a complete Chicago seminary development system with Bishop George Mundelein, Auxiliary Bishop of Brooklyn and his eventual successor, while waiting for a train.

In February 1916, Archbishop Mundelein’s became Archbishop of Chicago. The following November, ground was broken at Rush and Chestnut Streets. Archbishop Quigley's vision became reality.

"This will unquestionably be the most beautiful building here in Chicago, not excluding the various buildings of the University of Chicago." George Cardinal Mundelein.

The cornerstone for the early French Gothic structure was laid in September 1917. The first classes at the new Quigley Memorial Preparatory Seminary were held one year later. The first Mass was held by Archbishop Mundelein on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8, 1918, during which six priests were ordained.

Quigley's Chapel of St. James was modeled on the Sainte-Chapelle in Paris, the royal chapel built by King Louis IX to house the relics of the crown of thorns. It was dedicated upon the seventy-fifth anniversary of the Archdiocese of Chicago and Mundelein's twenty-fifth priestly ordination on June 10, 1920. Designed by the architecture firm of Gustav Steinbeck of New York and Zachary Taylor Davis [1], with stained glass by Robert Giles of the John J. Kinsella Company of Chicago. Its stunning rose window and other stained glass, composed of 650,000 individual pieces forming 245 scenes, are a Chicago treasure. Superb acoustics allow for musical performances that don't need to be amplified. Musical presentations include soloists, choirs and groups such as His Majestie's Clerkes and the Chicago Baroque Ensemble. It is one of Chicago's most breathtaking spiritual spaces.

Quigley’s alumni includes almost 2,500 priests, two cardinals, more than forty-one bishops, two Vatican II periti, recipients of the Medal of Honor and the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and two members of the Basketball Hall of Fame.

One of the more interesting events in Quigley Seminary's history occured on Tuesday, May 18, 1937. Cardinal Mundelein, speaking to 500 priests at a quarterly diocesan conference, lashed out at Nazi leaders Adolf Hitler, Joseph Goebbels, and Hermann Göring for using the pretext of "immorality" and sexual scandals to attack Catholic religious orders, organizations, and German Catholic schools, which at the time educated two million children, saying:

"The fight is to take the children away from us. If we show no interest in this matter now, if we shrug our shoulders and mutter, 'Maybe there is some truth in it, or maybe it is not our fight;' if we don't back up our Holy Father (Pope Pius XI) when we have a chance, well when our turn comes we, too, will be fighting alone. . . . Perhaps you will ask how it is that a nation of sixty million people, intelligent people, will submit in fear to an alien, an Austrian paperhanger, and a poor one at that I am told, and a few associates like Goebbels and Göring who dictate every move of the people's lives…" [2]

Nazi minister Goebbels, labeled a "crooked minister of propaganda" in the same speech by Mundelein, responded furiously within days at a mass rally with 18,000 attendants, demanding that the Vatican discipline Mundelein, which it refused to do. Nazi attacks on German Catholic institutions intensified, and 200 Catholic newspapers were shut down. [3] In Philadelphia, the International Brotherhood of Painters, Paperhangers, and Decorators for their part took exception to the Cardinal's classification of Hitler as a "paperhanger" in any case, despite Mundelein's remarks "he was not a very good one." [4]

[1]		Zachary Taylor Davis was the architect of several major Chicago buildings, including Old Comiskey Park (1910), Wrigley Field (1914), Mount Carmel High School(1924), and St. James Chapel of Archbishop Quigley Preparatory Seminary (1918). Davis graduated from the Armour Institute of Technology (now the Illinois Institute of Technology). He began his career working as a draftsman for Louis Sullivan, along with Frank Lloyd Wright.
[2]		"Mundelein rips into Hitler for Church attacks," Chicago Tribune, 5/19/1937, pg. 7]
[3]		"Nazis unleash vicious attacks on Roman Catholic Church," Chicago Tribune, 5/29/1937]
[4]		Edward R. Kantowicz, Corporation Sole: Cardinal Mundelein and Chicago Catholicism, Notre Dame Press, 1983

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